was the inaugural year in an ongoing project dedicated to the observation of the sun every time it crossed the horizon and to sharing the awareness of that moment with others. Beginning on Monday evening December 31, 2007, at 4:59 PST, Brenda Hutchinson will ring a bell everyday at sunrise and sunset- indefinitely. Documentation for the first year follows. She invites others to join her wherever you may be and to post to the blog if you wish.

Saturday, September 20, 2008

9/13 AM BEFORE The painters are moving so quickly on our house I wanted to get a picture of it in the early stages so that we could do a before and after comparison. I was also looking for a minimal activity that would capture both the moment of the sunrise and the condition of the house. So I had asked Norman if he would mind just sticking his arm out the front window and ring a bell he liked while I went outside and recorded a little movie. It seemed like a good plan until we went to open the windows and found they had been painted shut.

9/14 AM Celebrating the Purple Primer I'm just walking around in my pink pajamas in front of our house with the newly painted purple primer. Greeting the sunrise.

9/14 PM Sunday Evening Bells

9/15 AM Cosmic Downbeat After 3 hours sleep, I decided to postpone going to the Ferry building until Wednesday morning. Instead, I wandered out into a quiet the backyard dangling the large cymbal bells. I had heard a crow out there while I was waking up and thought he would make a good companion. Much to my surprise, a different, sweet little voice piped in right at the first chime. Then suddenly, it was as if someone released machine sounds into the still and peaceful air. The trolley started up the street as an airplane flew overhead. It was as if the morning began on some large unseen downbeat.

9/18 AM AFTER

Last night before I went to bed I thought about where I would like to ring the bells in the morning. Since we had just finished painting our house, I thought it’d be nice to include the house in the documentation. One of my favorite things about the way the house looks now is the set of little lion heads above the windows. At first we didn’t see them. We thought they were just plaster medallions. Once we realized they were cats, we decided that when we finally got around to painting them, we would like to make them look like our cranky cat, Malcolm. However, when the time finally came, we were afraid to go up on the ladder. So we asked one of the painters if he would mind painting their little faces for us. Instead of mini-Malcolm portraits, we opted for a minimal touch to the lion face with only the eyes and mouths filled in with color. I love them. Each one is different and I had planned to ring a bell for each lion when I went out this morning. Unfortunately, when I stumbled outside this morning, I was only half conscious. While I remembered that I wanted o ring the bell five times, I forgot why. It wasn’t until I finished ringing the bell and the sun had come up that I remembered about welcoming the cats to their first sunrise experience with new eyes.

9/18 PM Clean windows. Clear evening. The painters have long ladders. Very tall and shaky ladders. As long as they were already up that high to paint, they cleaned the windows. Thank you guys! I can't believe what we've been missing.

9/19 PMRed sky in morning, sailors take warningRed sky at night, sailors’ delightThe weather pattern along the coast in Northern California is so much different than the east coast that I never thought that saying applied to the west coast. There aren’t many thunderstorms. It’s mostly fog or drizzle as far as water in the air. No snow. No hurricanes or extreme weather conditions of any kind. Earthquakes are the extreme nature occurrence out here, not precipitation. So when it was so beautiful and red this morning, Norman quoted that little poem and I said, oh no not out here. Well. It is drizzling out here this evening. But it's not a dreary drizzle. It's deposited a gentle sheen on the ground so that everything shimmers (audio). Just a little bit.

9/20 AM The first sound I heard when I woke up this morning was the ticking of the clock. Although it didn’t happen immediately or all at once. I gradually noticed what had been there all along. Gentle, steady reliable and persistent. It made a big impression on me- that erosive pawing at my awareness. So I decided to accompany that soft tick with a chime on the bowl for one minute as the sun rose. A small soundbridge (audio) from the night to the morning.

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Brenda Hutchinson (with another bell)

photo by Liz Keim. Texas 2006

Got Bells?

Wouldn’t it be great to wake up and hear bells ringing all over the place? Big bells, little bells? Next door and way down the street? Something you could do with your friends or by yourself? Wherever you happened to be at the time. Everyday. Sun up and sun down.

Invitation

These are my little bells

I don’t really collect bells. But when I went around my house looking for them, I found them hanging all over the place. So, this is my bell supply, and I will make sure I have one of these with me wherever I go. Just in case.

something new in March

Beginning in March, I will only post to the blog every few days. However, I will still be ringing the bell everyday at sunrise and sunset and will post daily on my site at youtubeif you want to see more details.

Public Ringing Event #1- DONE!

Fat Tuesday, Februrary 5. We did it. Sunrise and sunset by the sea. Anyone else ring today? Where were you? Who came? What happened?Please share your story...

PUBLIC RINGING EVENT #2- DONE!

Nobody showed up in the morning in the parking lot at The Exploratorium.However, several people wandered by in the evening. It was kind of a staggered affair. After the sunset, we noticed a full moon rising in the west.

HAPPY SPRING!

Public Ringing Event #3- DONE!

A small but enthusiastic audience at the Fossil Fool stage joined in the sunset ringing at this year's Maker Faire on Saturday, May 3. Audience members volunteer to pedal power generating bicycles- otherwise there is no sound. That wasn't a problem this evening. The band was plenty loud.